The networked and mobile computing environment that defines much of contemporary society has provided innumerable convenience and productivity benefits. Given such benefits—society have become increasingly dependent upon services delivered thereon. Perhaps unknown to many, underlying these services are vast optical networks transporting incalculable volumes of data.
Free-space optical communication is the optical transmission of data over free-space (i.e., air/vacuum) using light as the transmission medium. In contrast to optical communication over optical fiber, free-space optical communication is employed in those locations where optical fibers are not already—or able to be—deployed. As such, free-space optical communication underlies many existing communications facilities including burgeoning applications such as deep space communications for NASA, the European Space Agency's European Data Relay System wherein geosynchronous satellites transmit data between satellites, spacecraft, unmanned aerial vehicles, and ground stations and, Facebook's and Google's Internet.org project and Project Loon, respectively, which attempt to provide otherwise inaccessible Internet service across the globe.
As society's communications data requirements continue to unabatedly increase, there exists a compelling need to increase the data speed of free-space optical communication. Given the utility, importance, and necessity of free-space optical communications and networks constructed therefrom, systems, methods, and structures that enhance their data carrying capabilities would represent a welcome addition to the art.